The legally embattled former president improved all his margins in Iowa from 2016 – the caucus won by Ted Cruz – with 51% of the vote. Trump won 98 of 99 counties, and his only loss – in Johnson County to Nikki Haley – was by a single vote. Haley pulled in 1,271 votes to Trump's 1,270, according to data from NBC News.
But the reality, Blaze TV host and author Steve Deace said on American Family Radio Thursday, is that Trump was only preaching to the choir.
"If you're looking ahead for 290 days from now, there are some very ominous signs within those numbers. Everybody retreats to their silos and looks for confirmation more than information. The goal is Nov. 5 – and there are three things I would be very concerned about moving forward," Deace told show host Jenna Ellis.
Though Trump's overall totals were impressive, he wasn't as strong in the Iowa suburbs as necessary, Deace noted.
Suburbs were a problem for Republicans in last fall's elections. The New York Times reported that suburban voters in Washington, DC; Louisville, Kentucky; and Ohio's Big 3 of Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland, all rejected GOP positions on social issues and crime. Those November results sent a "signal that while [voters] may fret over President Biden's age and capabilities, they may worry more about Republican positions in the era of Donald J. Trump," the Times wrote then.
However, Deace said it's not the platform that's failing Trump in the nearby outskirts of urban centers. It's his likability.
"Though Trump got 51% across the state, in the suburbs of Iowa he got 41%. We are seeing in a dominant win the president demonstrating a weakness with suburban voters yet again. He's going to have to broaden his appeal, not his message; everybody knows they were better off [when he was president]," Deace said.
The economic angle only goes so far. Apparently, some Americans are willing to endure suffering to a degree. "As long as they're not suffering enough, they will afford themselves the luxury of voting on mean tweets," Deace added.
And he conceded the bitter cold and travel conditions that Iowans faced during their election process. The state still should have produced a better turnout of faith voters, he said.
"We had almost a 10-point drop in white evangelical turnout from 2016. You can attribute some of that to the weather; you can also say we're watching the Church in America erode in relevance in real time. [Republicans are] not winning a national election with depressed white evangelical turnout like that," he said.
No new voters for Trump in Iowa
Perhaps the biggest problem for Trump's Iowa numbers, according to Deace, is that so many who voted for him were going to support him no matter what. The bottom line is that in Iowa, Trump really didn't pull in new voters. That's a big problem in a much closer national election.
"The Iowa poll got Trump's percentage almost exactly right – and yet that same Iowa poll found that only 48% of Iowa Republicans identify as 'MAGA.' Seventy-eight percent who voted identified as MAGA. There was an oversampling of MAGA. Even with 78% of those calling themselves MAGA being an Iowa caucus voter, almost one-third said they would not vote for Trump if he were a convicted felon," Deace said.
The former president has been charged with 91 felonies across four different criminal cases. That includes 44 federal charges and 47 state charges. Trump has denied wrong-doing in each case.
In New York, Trump faces 34 felony counts in connection with hush money payments to an adult entertainment performer. He faces 91 felony counts in the state of Georgia. Among those are election interference, risking national security secrets and falsifying business records in connection with the porn star accusations.
If voters hold true to withholding support for a convicted felon, the Democrats "only have to go one-for-91," Deace said. "If I'm a Democrat operative, I was gleeful to see that. That plays out to every trap I'd planned. If I'm an analyst for the DNC, whatever corpse they decide to nominate and put up later this year, I'm pretty gleeful in these numbers."
Could Sanders help Trump in suburbs?
Deace suggested Trump could help himself with suburban voters if he would take on Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders as his running mate, allow her to run a shadow campaign for the 2028 GOP nomination, and turn her loose in those green, leafy neighborhoods. But such a plan would likely mean more attention for his running mate than Trump would be comfortable allowing, Deace acknowledged.
Sanders (right), who previously served as Trump's White House press secretary, endorsed him for president in early November.
Several other women have been mentioned as a possible running mate on a Trump ticket, including GOP Representatives Nancy Mace (South Carolina) and Elise Stefanik (New York); and Nikki Haley, a former South Carolina governor and former U.N. ambassador under Trump, who at present remains a Trump primary challenger.
Former challenger Vivek Ramaswamy has also been mentioned. He pulled out of the race earlier this week.
In a townhall meeting with Fox News days before the Iowa caucuses, Trump offered no hints at who might stand by his side in the fall – but he indicated a path has been set. "I can't tell you that really; I mean, I know who it's going to be," he said.
